Yeah, absolutely.

This recently happened to someone I knew who was addicted to alcohol, 9 months later they died from a combo of alcohol, Xanax and Fentanyl.

Let me preface this with I'm not a doctor, I also never tried Xanax / Fentanyl and I don't "really" drink alcohol. The air quotes mean I drink about a handful of beers a year at assorted family events and occasionally when socializing. I'm not saying that to brag or be like "look at me, I'm above that!", I just want to paint the picture here that I don't have first hand experience on how easily it is to get addicted to this stuff, know what it feels like or how hard it must be to quit.

Anyways, here's 1 potential formula for how someone ends up dying after being prescribed Xanax when a doctor knows the patient has addictive behaviors and drinks a lot:

1. They're addicted to alcohol to the point where they feel compelled to drink very often. Not just a beer a day, but more like lots and lots of Vodka.

2. They try going to rehab multiple times and it fails every time within a month or 2 after returning.

3. They get prescribed Xanax by a doctor.

4. They have an addictive personality in general and get addicted to Xanax.

5. This helps for a brief amount of time (weeks or months perhaps).

6. They end up drinking again.

7. They very quickly discover drinking while taking Xanax has a whole new effect.

8. They run out of prescribed Xanax.

9. They attempt to find it on the street and do.

10. They enter a world of street drugs and now Xanax turns into Xanax plus Fentanyl (intentional or not, I don't know how it becomes laced, etc.).

11. They do this combo for a bit and one day they go-to sleep and never wake up from heart failure.

The question I ask myself all the time now is if step 3 didn't happen, would the outcome have been the same? My gut tells me no way, being introduced to Xanax started the chain of events that lead to death.

If you can't fall asleep without a drink, xanax would be a good choice. If you need a drink in your hand all day, I'd guess librium. If you're drinking from shift end until you pass out, probably ativan.

Alcoholism takes a lot of different forms, and obviously a doctor should come up with a taper plan.

But I think the reason these drugs (which actually work) aren't first line treatments is puritanical. They feel good, so giving them to alcoholics to feel just as good (or better) than they did with their drinks feels uneasy. But it really works, and it can be much more easily tapered and controlled.

It's frustrating to watch after having seen multiple people successfully taper themselves off booze with other drugs (without doctor's supervision, sadly).

Opiate/oid withdrawal is pretty awful. You feel like you will die, but that seldom happens (unless you have other issues).

Withdrawal from alcohol, on the other hand, is, quite frequently, deadly (that's why medical alcohol detox is recommended).

Benzo withdrawals make alcohol withdrawals look like a case of the sniffles.

I think that we are best off, with no addiction to anything, but I also know that many folks can't seem to achieve that.

But deliberately addicting to benzos is crazy. They do use drugs like Librium to medically detox folks from alcohol, but that is quite short term, and is meant to keep you from dying.